5G at Felixstowe

The port along with consortium members, Three UK, Blue Mesh Solutions and the University of Cambridge was successful in an application for grant funding under the government-funded 5G Testbeds and Trials programme.

The project will run until September this year and comprises two use cases – predictive maintenance of quay cranes using Internet of Things (IoT) sensors and providing communications for remote control yard cranes.

“As part of the 5G project, six quay cranes are being fitted with IoT sensors to understand the stresses and strains placed on them by day-to-day operation,” explained Karen Poulter, head of information services, Port of Felixstowe, and 5G project lead.

“Using the data generated by the IoT sensors and linking it to the actual activity on the crane together with previous maintenance records, Cambridge University is developing an algorithm to predict equipment failure and suggest the optimum time to maintain the equipment,” she continued.

The 5G network can handle the huge volume of data collected which will be used to train the algorithm at levels that wouldn’t be sustainable over 4G. “5G allows IoT systems to operate in a denser and more data rich environment,” commented Richard Brooks, managing director, Blue Mesh Solutions.

“Combining modern sensors with IoT technology to manage data backhaul allows data to be used in new ways, such as combining the sensors with artificial intelligence algorithms to search for inferences in data that are hidden from standard analysis methods.

“Building these ‘Digital Twins’ is the future of computer and engineering science and 5G is an enabling technology,” he added.